Books, arts and culture

Poetry and music

The Q&A: Eric Whitacre, composer

ERIC WHITACRE'S musical influences range from classical choir to Duran Duran. A Grammy-nominated graduate of the Julliard school, his dreams of becoming a pop star were rerouted by his epiphanic time in a college choir in Las Vegas. His compositions are imaginative and occasionally intrepidly modern, with pieces that range from the soothingly classical, as in "Waternight", "Cloudburst" and "A Boy and a Girl" (works based on poems by Octavio Paz), to the humorously adventurous, as with "Ghost Train", "Godzilla Eats Las Vegas" and "Animal Crackers". His musical, "Paradise Lost: Shadows and Wings", is an innovative take on Milton's masterpiece, involving a choir, techno, anime-inspired costumes and martial arts. His versatile works have been performed with equal success at New York's Lincoln Centre and London's Westminster Cathedral, and are featured in "Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides".

One of Mr Whitacre's most novel endeavours was conducting a ‘virtual choir' composed of videos of people around the world singing "Light & Gold" (Lux Aurumque). The outcome was released in 2010 on YouTube as "Virtual Choir 1.0" and followed by "Virtual Choir 2.0" in April 2011, which united voices of 2,000 people from 58 countries, all singing to a webcam. (The idea came from a female chorister who recorded herself singing the piece, and posted it on YouTube.)

Mr Whitacre spoke to us over the phone from his penthouse in Los Angeles, where he lives with his wife (a Grammy-winning soprano, Hila Plitmann) and their son.

How is conducting a virtual choir different from doing it live?

It was the strangest experience ever, because I was conducting in complete silence, therefore hearing the music only in my head and trying to imagine what it would sound like sang by all these people around the world. And I was in the room alone with the camera crew, so they were watching me wave my arms around for five minutes. Also, I'm not getting any feedback from the performers, so I'm trying to give as many cues as I can without knowing how the people out there will respond.

What is the importance of technology in the way classical music is being created today?

Many composers use software to write music—programs like Finale or Sibelius. There are also recording programs. I should say I'm still very old-fashioned, I still use pencil and paper. But almost every composer I know does it the ‘new way.'

Does that affect the outcome?

I think it does. It would be dangerous for me, for example, to compose using technology like that because of the possibility of copying and pasting, which is so easy on a computer. If you're writing by hand it's difficult, so you think harder before you put it down. I think more easily when I'm using pencil and paper.

What's possible now, in the age of software and the internet that wasn't possible before—other than conducting a virtual choir? Can we talk of a global musical community that did not exist in, say, the 19th century?

In Paris, at the beginning of the 20th century, Debussy went to see a Gamelan orchestra and it completely changed his writing and basically blew his mind. But today I can go through 30 or 40 genres of music in one day, just by browsing the web, so the exposure to different kinds of music and therefore different ideologies is unprecedented. As a composer I know that all sorts of sounds I hear are making their way into my brain and soul, and later sneak into my music. That's the first thing. The second one—it's just so easy now to find people who have similar interests. If you like classical music, for instance, you don't necessarily have to commute to find other enthusiasts; you can be a part of a very vibrant community online. There might be people there who like the specific kind of classical music that you like. You can talk to them about different recordings and live performances, conductors, performers, etc.

How does electronic music fit in with classical music, as it does in your "Paradise Lost"? Does the electronically created music have the same aura as the music produced by human hands?

In the case of "Paradise Lost", which is partially classical music, partially musical theatre and partially electronica, it fits in seamlessly and effortlessly. It joins all the kinds of music I love. Now, something that technology can do which musicians cannot do with classical instruments is to convey greater power and achieve a metrical precision that is machine-like. I'm not saying that is better, but these are some traits of electronic music. What I've learned is that when you have a very musical live performance—using classical instruments—then adding this rigid electronic music creates something really beautiful.

Many of your pieces are influenced by poetry. What decides whether a poem is going to make a good musical piece?

A musical relationship with a poem is very much like an actual relationship with a person. There's the stage of seduction, when I'm first reading it and the poem is flirting with me. Then there's the part when I'm completely ‘into it.' Then there's the stage of a real relationship when I'm trying to express myself musically—so the music sounds like the poetry feels to me.

In case of "Light and Gold" I had a concept that was supposed to be a bit higher than poetry. My idea was that I can teach the audience how to breathe—for the first two measures the chorus' sings crescendo for four beats and then decrescendo for four beats; the crescendo for four beats, decrescendo for four beats. So what the choir is doing without the audience even knowing it is teaching it to breathe in… and breathe out. Breathe in, breathe out. The audience doesn't realise that they're being manipulated, but the effect is palpable. For example, people come to me after the concert and say: ‘Wow, that piece—I felt so breathless at the end of it.' And that's exactly how they're supposed to feel. So in that instance the poem becomes a vehicle for a conceptual idea that's a little above the poem itself.

But you've run into some copyright problems with Robert Frost's estate?

It was unbelievable. A woman in Texas asked me if I could write a commissioned work to honour her parents who died within two weeks of each other, after over 50 years of marriage. She wanted it to be Robert Frost's "Stopping By Woods on a Snowy Evening". I was deeply moved by her request and agreed to take on the commission, though I wasn't sure if I could pull it off. I thought that some poems just didn't need my music. I gave it my best shot, and spent a long time working on it. Then, when I asked the Frost estate for publishing rights, they said ‘No.' Not only that, but they said that if they find out that I've used the poem they would sue not only me but the choir. So I thought the piece would become dead before the poem becomes public domain in 2038, but my wife suggested I call Tony Silvestri, who is a dear friend of mine and a poet that I've worked with before. I basically told him: you have to write a poem with the exact metrical structure of Robert Frost's poem, which would fit the music I wrote in exactly the same places where I painted something musically to illuminate the words. The entire piece had to end in this meditative suite, repeating something over and over, to fit Robert Frost's ending: ‘And miles to go before I sleep.' I called him that same night, and he called me in the morning the next day with a poem called Sleep, which is just so beautiful and tender that… I like it a lot better than Robert Frost's poem.

With poets, and with novelists, it's hard to avoid the question of autobiographical elements. What about music? Are there autobiographical elements in your work?

Yes, in fact my pieces are hyper-biographical. I can't write music unless I'm deeply connected to it and that connection almost always comes from some experience that I have had or am having. For example, in the fall of 2010 I was at the Cambridge University as visiting fellow, and my son was five years old. Every day I would take him to his pre-school, which was a 25-minute walk outside of Cambridge. We would walk along the Cam River, and it was just so beautiful—the water, the woods and that incredible architecture of Cambridge; as well as being with my son all the time. It was such a fusion. Sometimes when I was walking I would start singing. Around this time the cellist Julian Lloyd Webber asked me to write a piece for his 60th birthday concert and I knew even as he was asking I would use these fragments as foundation. I wrote a piece called ‘The River Cam' inspired by my time at Cambridge—the all-encompassing colours, the fall and early winter. I can hear the architecture in it; I can hear the history, and the time that I've spent with my son alongside that beautiful river.

@Kadune, I don't know why you said "pedant". That's no trivial insignificance. Especially when the subjec title is "Poetry and Music". Thanks. I actually had paused, assuming correctness, and wondered what the content might be, as the connotations are vastly different. Not to mention I couldn't find it googling. Again thanks.